


Reconstruction

by Lady_R



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alphys Is Mettaton's Mum, Crying, Depression, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Mettaton And Undyne Become Allies After The Genocide Run, Mettaton Cries A Lot, Mettaton NEO Survives, Post-Undertale Genocide Route, There Should Be More Stories About These Two, Undyne The Undying Survives, What-If, You're Gonna See That In Many Of My Future Fics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-15
Updated: 2017-02-15
Packaged: 2018-09-24 18:49:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9780407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_R/pseuds/Lady_R
Summary: They came, they went, and all they left in their trail was death and dust.And now that the human has vanished from the Underground it’s up to those who remain to keep the pieces and try to limit the damage.Alphys is dead, in one last, desperate act of heroism for a friend who could have never thanked her. Undyne, born again thanks to the strength of her determination, can’t do anything but remember her and try not to succumb to the pain. Mettaton, escaped at the last minute to certain death, has instead no way to escape from his guilt and from a fictitious personality he can’t take anymore.The determined warrior and the artificial-bodied superstar. Left alone after an undeserved apocalypse, joined together by a common loss and by an as common responsibility, different in character but fragile and tired in the same way, with the fate of a world which can barely stand on its own in their hands. A world that needs to be protected, reassured, and most of all reconstructed.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Undyne The Undying and Mettaton NEO have somehow survived Chara's rage in the Genocide run.  
> What will they do, now that they're all alone and their world has been torn to pieces?

 

Still in from of the door of the royal palace, Undyne feels that there is something wrong.

The body drops that flow on her skin disgust her, but she has to get through it. Not for long, just until the Determination stops mixing and compacting her up like melted wax.

She’d pay for the human to see her, two times killed and two times reborn, ready to avenge her murdered dears. These poor dogs, so innocent… in some way, she loved them. She’s going to miss their licks and their amused yelping.

But Alphys… Alphys, how could she?

She had seen her from the hideout’s TV screens, while the nurses kept telling her not to move, not to rush herself. Who were they to tell her what to do? Especially while the woman she loved was throwing herself in front of the human’s knife, to protect with her body that… thing she seemed to love so dearly.

Dead… dead…

Undyne holds her still flabby fists. She’ll mourn her beloved later on. At least Asgore has to be safe. If Asgore’s dead, there’s no hope.

It’s almost ironic how all those who left were in some way those she loved the most. After the dogs Papyrus, the nice Papyrus, that Undyne was certain, was smiling even when the blade was cutting though him. After Papyrus Alphys, her Alphys, sacrificed to save that… she has no words to describe him. And after Alphys Sans too: Undyne didn’t see him, she didn’t come fast enough, but the torn hoodie on the floor and the dust that polluted the air in the destroyed corridor left no room for doubts.

“I hope that at least you made that cursed thing suffer”

The throne room is silent and the air is heavy with dust. Undyne prays, begs, pleads that it’s not her king. She fully knows that behind his yellow flowers tea with marshmallow stuck in the beard drinking “Fuzzy Pushover” facade there was a ruthless warrior ready to do anything to protect his subjects. But the human has beaten her: nothing’s certain with that beast.

And her fears turn into reality. Undyne brings her soft hands to the face, appalled. A purple, shredded mantle lies abandoned in the room’s corner, next to a trident, shattered in two like a small branch, and a shattered crown on the side.

“Too late”.

She curses herself for coming. She’s not even fully corporeal yet. What was she planning to do? Die a third time?

“Fool, fool, fool”

Two lone tears come from her eyes. Nothing more. Her malformed body still can’t take it. She hates being powerless, and she’s never been so much before.

As soon as she opens her eyes she sees him, lying on the side in the middle of the flowers.

 

The coincidence is so infuriating it almost makes her laugh-

“Out of all those who could have stayed, why did it have to be you? Papyrus was nice and kind, Sans was affectionate and as strong as a rock, Alphys… my Alphys was the sweetest and most precious thing that ever lived, Asgore was our ruler, he was good and brave… what are you? What is your purpose? We have no need for you, you wretched tin can.”

Alphys struck by the human falls on the ground, already partially desolved, and he flees. He flees, the coward, the stupid and empty soubrette made of steel and circuits, and vanishes with his ridiculous little wings before the human can kill him too.

Just to come back later.

He probably thinks monsters’ dust is some kind of beauty cream.

Undyne has no time to waste with that cursed coward.

-Get up.- she orders.

He turns around hurriedly. As soon as he recognizes her, his expression relaxes and stretch into an elegant, symmetric smile. A perfect compass-traced half moon.

-Undyne.- he whispers. -Have you come for my autograph?-

-Get up.- Undyne repeats without changing her tone in the slightest-

-Darling…- Mettaton blinks voluptuously. His lips grin with his usual ice prince appeal.

Hate. Hate. Hate.

-I suppose you won’t do me the courtesy of offering me an arm.-

Undyne bites her lips in irritation, feeling with disgust the flabby incompletion.

-Get up.- 

-Your vocabulary is pretty limited, darling.-

Mettaton’s eyes pierce her with their sufficiency stare. Undyne can’t take it anymore. She throws herself on him and grabs his arm with a strong pull.

-You’re coming with me now!- she roars, as if she was facing a centuries old enemy. 

Mettaton’s arm unplugs itself from his torso and dangles from her hand like a broken sword. The robot barely even whimpers. He probably doesn’t care about that as well.

Undyne stops breathing, appalled.

“A chunk of metal with no joints. Like an armor without a helm: useless”.

-You could have told me straight away, instead of doing that monologue.- she hisses in his direction.

Mettaton pulls out the tip of his tongue. -That way, it’d be so boring.-

Undyne wheezes, barely holding herself from stomping her feet.

“The nerve of that guy”.

The robot leans on his remaining elbow, posing like a model.

-Plug my arm back in.- he says, disarmingly calm. -They’re magnetic. They go back in their place.-

Undyne follows the advice with rushed movements. “Alphys is forever lost, yet he can be effortlessly put back together. Isn’t that an injustice?”

-I’ll bring you to the hideout with the others.- she tells in a commanding tone. -You’ll be able to rest, take refreshments and be cured. You’re insufferable, but you’re a citizen of the Underground too.-

-Too nice, dear.- the star answers, running a hand through his hair.

Undyne pretends not to have heard him. She lifts him up, realizing she’s now fully old. A feeling of ephemeral comfort after all that happened.

-Don’t expect a special treatment just because it’s you. You’ll be treated just like the others. And don’t think you’ll have time to sign autographs, you get me?-

Mettaton doesn’t seem to care. He curls up in her hold, reclining his head on her chest.

“Did he mistake me for his babysitter or what?”

He’s not as heavy as she thought, but he’s as cold as Ice Wolf’s ice blocks. Undyne doesn’t know if that’s because of the metal or his condition at the moment. On the side of the window of an abandoned house lies a torn tent. She picks it up and wraps the dismembered creature in her arms with it. Then she walks back through the destroyed city of New Home, holding him up throughout the walk.

In the silence of the dead city, even Mettaton keeps his speech on hold. Evidently not even a diva like him is immune to loss.

Or maybe he’s weak, even too weak to talk.

Or afraid.

Or maybe, Undyne strongly suspects it, his silence is nothing but a cold shoulder. Like children who, irritated by their parents, refuse to answer them.

With his arms bundled up to his chest, his hair reduced to an indistinct tangle, his face cracked and smudgy, his androgynous body completely covered by the ripped tent, Mettaton has the virginal fragility of the human statues Undyne has seen in many anime and manga. His pink cuirass is dusty, scratched in many points, almost as much as one of her armors.

He stays silent, half unconscious, rocking himself with spasm-shaking arms. 

They reach the hideout without him ever making any other movement: a cave hidden in the Waterfall zone, whose access is hidden by numerous boulders. A wide natural room, furnished at best with bunk beds, rag tents and camp cookers.

“Alphys… what a great thing you’ve done”.

-She was really good.- Mettaton whispers in her arm, with the tone of a small child in front of their first idol. -It’s so sad she can’t see the result.-

-Shut yourself, you stupid diva.- Undyne hisses shaking him. -You can’t mention her. Not after what you’ve done.-

A warrior shouldn’t hate those on her side, Undyne fully knows that, but the revulsion Mettaton provokes her is something she can’t push on the side.

“You didn’t love her. You betrayed her, you fool. You should have died with her.”

Yes, die with her. Alphys would have died for him. And would have died without him as well. If only she hadn’t escaped the hideout… if she hadn’t run off to the Core to face off with that human… blocking with her fragile small body the beast’s knife, as Mettaton lied on the ground, powerless… fragile… defeated…

A spectacle unworthy of television.

Papyrus, poor Papyrus, she would have never seen again, had always loved him.

“Come on, Undyne… he’s nice… he’s so upbeat…”

Undyne gulps holding a sob.

“Would you have saved him, Papyrus? Would you have died for him like Alphys too? Half the Underground would have done that. Apparently Mettaton has some kind of magnetic charm towards them”.

-He’s wounded.- Undyne tells the nurses who rush to them as soon as they see her. -Repair him. I’m fine. I just want to go back to bed.-

Two gem-headed beings and a lion with a curly orange mane. Mettaton’s sight seems to be a blessing to them.

-Thanks for bringing him to us, Undyne.- the lion says with a shaky voice.

Undyne nods her head, wondering what they could possibly feel for such an empty and measly creature.

“Superficial. Spoiled. Narcissistic.

Desperate. Disillusioned. As fragile as glass”.

Nurses take him away from her arms and carry him to a tent closed by a sheet, nailed to the sides. Undyne recognizes two of Alphys’ friends, the alligator and the cat. They don’t even look like themselves, dressed in white and with no make-up. The care they give to the battered up robot is something unseen. 

Undyne wonders if anyone, except maybe Alphys, would ever take care of her in such a way.

From inside the tent, someone screams “Mettaton? He’s alive? We saw him die! That’s a miracle!”

Undyne should be disgusted by it, but for some reason she feels something else. Interest, maybe? 

And a strange idea moves along in her head.

“What a foolish thought. Why would I do such a thing? With him? His main issue right now is probably nail varnish. What does he know about what we need now?”

But does she know?

She has fought so many battles… is it possible that such a thing scares her?

In any case, she decides as she curls up in an empty crib at the side of the room, she’ll think about it tomorrow. She’s too tired to make future plans.

Maybe dreams will help her get over Alphys.

 

-Undyne?-

What does he want now?

Halfway repaired, a heavy black blanket on the shoulders, and two dilated eyes smeared of halfway melted eyeshadow, he looks like a drum housewife right out of the worst human telenovela.

Undyne isn’t sure she wants to interact with him. It’s nighttime and she’s tired. He should be too.

“Why do you have to be so… dependent? Can’t you hold yourself?These legs you brag about so much don’t work like they should?”

-What’s happening to you?- she asks covering her slumberous face with her hand. The other one gets close with small shy steps, nothing to do with the lopes he rode the stage during the human’s attack.

He clings to the bedside as if he can’t hold himself on his feet, and looks at her in an almost tender way.

-I had a bad dream. Can I sleep with you?-

Undyne is unsure whether to start laughing coarsely or slap him in the face, just to end up realizing she’s too tired to do any of these things. 

“He really did mistake me for his nanny”

Whatever the case is, she thinks a quick approach is better.

-No. Go back to bed.- she says turning to the other side of the crib.

He doesn’t move, not even slightly. His glass eyes keep shining with some kind of childish fear. He’s pretty expressive for a machine. Maybe that’s why monsters loved him so much.

-Isn’t there a fan of yours to cuddle up with?-

Undyne blinks and runs a hand on his eyes. When he gets it back, his glove is stained with oil.

-I don’t want cuddles, Undyne. Enough of that.- he says with a cold voice that’s not his.

-But please… let me stay with you. Even on the ground. I can’t sleep.-

Undyne violently sighs. An attention-seeking diva is the last thing he wants to see at that moment. As if her lack of sympathy for him wasn’t enough, his presence and his metallic voice remind her horribly of Alphys.

“Let’s try and make him content.” she decides, turning again to the battered-up robot. “Maybe a small gift would be enough to make him content.”

-On the ground is fine.- she says, hinting with a tired gesture at the empty floor on the side of her crib. -As long as you’re comfortable. I suppose a star like you isn’t used to the hard floor.-

Mettaton brushes his gloves on his face again. -I have a back of steel. It won’t bother me.-

He chuckles with an expression anything but amused. Then, with fatigued movements, he turns on his back and lies down like a tomb statue, hands curled up the chest and stretched legs.

Undyne glares at him in the shadow, barely lit by a cold transversal light. 

“You don’t look so bad… without all that makeup on”

His glass face is cracked like a mask someone stepped on, but she likes the candor of the glaze. It reminds her of the environments that are familiar to her: Snowdin’s ice, Waterfall’s alabaster foam, Hotland’s pale cinders, and New Home’s light marble. 

But the untouched whiteness is quickly traced by black, thick lines, like the legs of a parasite bug. Undyne can’t unseen it.

The great star is crying. He has cupped a hand on his lips to silence the sobs, but Undyne is close enough to distinctly hear him. His photographic glass eyes, a vivacious cyclamen, one of Alphys’ masterpieces, drip black oil on the beautiful glazed face. He looks like a sad clown.

“Looks like? He is.”

And in the silence, Undyne hears a name. A name that hurts her like a thousand humans.

-Alphys… Alphys…-

Undyne clenches her fingers round the blanket, irritated. That obnoxious machine seems to be programmed exactly to press all her worst keys. 

“Now I’ll teach him to say her name. How dare he?”

Her fists instinctively clench. Undyne has cruel desires, unfit for a warrior. She wants to throw herself abruptly on that insufferable bundle of gears, shut his mouth with her hand, pressing it so hard it cracks his fake face even more, pushing these words back down his throat, teach him in the quickest and easiest way all the things not even a diva like him can do.

But Undyne doesn't forget who she is, and neither she forgets sweet, pacific Alphy, whose name comes out of the star's sculpted mouth in the form of choked-up sobs.

-Come up 'ere.- she says, keeping her voice down low. She stretches her muscular arms towards Mettaton so that he can reach them and pull himself upwards. He's weak, fatigued and clearly wounded. It takes Undyne a certain effort to pull him towards herself, sitting him next to her. Mettaton grabs the sheet from the crib and pulls it to his face, staining it it black oil. He's sitting in the lotus position and rocks back and forth like a frightened child.

Undyne snatches the sheet from his hand with a quick gesture. -Stop it. You'll make it all dirty. I need to sleep in this thing.-

Mettaton nods, bringing his hands to his face with chilling slowness. He covers his mouth and begins wailing.

-Alphys, I... I didn't mean to... I was scared... scared of death, I... I'm sorry...-

-Now, now...- Undyne pulls her hand to the robot's face and brushes it with her nail. -Stay calm now. Alphys wouldn't want to see you like this.-

-Alphys wouldn't want to be betrayed by her son.-

There's no expression in Mettaton's usually so constructed and emphatic voice. He has the monotonous tone you'd expect from a less beautiful and advanced robot, not from a masterpiece like him.

But even if in pronouncing these words he'd had the most perfect diction of his shiny career, Undyne wouldn't have hated them any less.

She grabs him from the back of his head, as if to push him on the ground with  a wrestling move, and clenches her sharp nails around his head, framed by messy, dusty plastic hair.

-Look at me! Look at me, you fool.-

Mettaton chokes a scream in his steel lips. He's almost as scared as if the human had suddenly returned.

"Reality's a nasty beast, especially for divas".

-That creature has defeated us all. Papyrus, then me... twice... then Sans, and then Asgore too. What did you think you were doing? You've never fought once in your life. You couldn't have saved Alp... her.-

She almost wants to scream. Only the thought of the hundreds of monsters resting in the hideout next to her, probably more scared of her and even of him, manages to hold her back. She keeps holding Mettaton's hands, who don't stop shaking just like the rest of his body.

-You would have died together. Then, what would have there been left?-

-You would have. You're brave and strong, unlike me. On your own, you could fix everything up.-

Undyne looks at him tenderly and pitifully. That unbolted carcass who used to call himself a superstar really has some out-of-place gears. 

-Not on my own, you dummy. You'll help me.-

Mettaton's eyes dilatate again.

-You're insane.-

He'd tried to curse, but his voice was cut halfway through by something that sounded like a sob.

"How long do I have to suffer through him?"

Weak, he's so week. The image creeps her out unexpectedly. He looks like a completely different person than the shiny, impeccable creature that fired up stages and enchanted all the audience. He has the meekness and resigned expression of a Waterfall ghost.

Suddenly, she remembers. Behind all that luminous metal there's a ghost. A ghost she knew, she had talked to; a ghost eternally wishing to be appreciated, determined till the end to satisfy his ambition so much so he'd sacrificed himself.

A weak, tired, deluded, guilt-filled ghost with black tears stricken cheeks.

A ghost whose name she knew.

-Happstablook.- she says coldly.

The metallic creature's eyes widen like flowers disclosing in the dawn. His mouth opens too, in a surprised or startled expression.

-Happstablook, I'm talking to you.- Undyne repeats. -I want you to help me.-

Mettaton rubs his gloves on his face for the third time, trying to block an endless stream of obsidian-coloured tears. His lips barely move, but no word leaves his steel mouth. 

-Calm yourself and listen to me. We have to start living again.-

His hands, covered by the stained gloves, shake like dry leaves. Undyne grabs them abruptly, holding them tightly and holding back their tremor with her warrior strength.

-Start living again, you get me? You... me... the Underground. We have to do it.-

Mettaton frantically blinks with eyelids framed by long face lashes.

Undyne takes a deep breath, and holds the mechanic hands with even more force.

-I need a star, and you're the only one around. I can keep people safe, yes, but... they need to feel safe, and I don't know how to do this. It's is your duty. If your dumb little songs can soothe them... maybe even snatch a smile from them... I want you to sing. Out loud.-

Mettaton huffs as if he's just ran for miles. -Alphys...- he barely whispers, strongly shaking.

-Alphys won't come back. We've gotta accept it... I don't know how.-

Her voice cracked too. Nostalgia is too strong a foe even for a warrior as mighty as she. Alphys, her beloved Alphys, destroyed by that horrible being that called themselves a "human".

And she's there, in the hideout Alphys herself had planned, alongside her only remaining creation: the most beautiful, the most living.

They're weak, dressed in rags, wounded and tired, for a battle they didn't want to fight. But if Undyne, Captain of the Guards whose arms were marked by plenty of scars, was at least prepared for a battle, Mettaton was completely defenseless. All that iron wasn't enough to protect an uncovered soul. And never before has Mettaton ever appeared barer and more vulnerable.

"He's falling to pieces. Just like me".

Undyne pushes away by force the thought of her lost loved one. No purpose in thinking about the dead. Those who won't come back don't need anything anymore. 

Those who remained, who have to put together all the pieces scattered everywhere, needs actual help.

A heroine, maybe.

-Come here, you.-

 

It's not a dream, nor an optical illusion. Undyne is hugging him. She holds him in her arm like a child who escaped a trauma, caressing his artificial hair, wiping his tears with her palmed hand and her sharp, reddish finger. The robot's glass eyes ooze drops of warm, pasty oil, but behind the black film, they shine of confort. 

Undyne doesn't feel foolish, not pathetic, and even less she's ashamed. Maybe she too needed a hug after all. She would have preferred to receive it from Alphys, or Asgore, or Papyrus, but Mettaton is all there is, and for what's worst, he's not the worst thing possible.

The robot weekly huffs, trying to hold back the sobs and the shakes. Undyne smiles and grabs his face in her hands.

-Tomorrow, I want you as smily and vivacious as I know you. We'll have a long day of work, and you'll have to do your best.-

-Yes... Yes, Undyne... I will...- his voice is still cracked, and it's still impossible to tell if it's because of weakness or emotions. Whatever it is, it feels genuine. Undyne greatly appreciates it.

What would she do to have known him for real, before the massacre.

She helps him lay on his side, carefully covering him with her blanker.

-We'll rebuild the Underground. Me and you. Together.-

Now that Mettaton has stopped crying, he limits himself to leaning his cheek on her chest like a child with his caretaker. But the light in his eyes is that of a man ready to start it all over.

-M-My hotel is still... still there. We could t-take refuge in it.- 

-That's what I like, prima donna. Great idea.- Undyne almost feels euphoric. The excitement for the future inebriates her. And from Mettaton's expression, she can tell he's starting to feel the same.

-When we'll feel better, we'll be able to start it over. We'll take care of each other.- She pets Mettaton's shoulder. -I could even feed you if you like. Sometimes... she heated up some engine oil for you. Maybe the one I use to polish my armor will appease you. It can't be that hard to make.-

-I-It'd be exquisite, Undyne.- he mumbles as an answer. His eyes close, his body stops shaking. He seems to be giving in against sleep.

"Then sleep, you stupid diva. Sleep and rest. A long battle awaits us.".

She wraps Mettaton's shoulders in her arm as if to protect him.

-For them.- she whispers. 

The miserable one's lips barely move as he answers her, his voice still breaking.

-F-For t-them.-

-For her.- Undyne proceeds in a firmer tone. 

This time, the answer isn't babbled, nor slurred. From his tone drips something similar to the determination that fills her up like oxygen.

She can tell they'll get along.

-For her.-

 


End file.
